Title Page, Copyright, Dedication

Contents

List of Illustrations

Preface

In December 2010 Trevor Lipscombe, as director of the Catholic University
of America Press, asked if I had any interest in putting together
a proposal for a brief history of Catholics in British America, a subject
that he found to be a fascinating one but little treated by historians. I immediately...

Introduction. The Context of Colonization

On March 27, 1625, Charles Stuart, son of James I, succeeded
his father as king of England, Scotland, and Ireland. His
pomp-filled coronation, occurring two days after the beginning
of the new year (the Feast of the Annunciation in the...

1. "To Sew the Holy Faith in His Land": The Calverts and the Beginnings of Caholic Setttlement

By the 1620s religious allegiance had become a more stable phenomenon
than it had been, certainly, in the previous century.
Conversions (or apostasies, depending on your viewpoint) were
a less common occurrence among Anglicans, Catholics, and Puritans...

2. "Holy Church Shall Have All Her Rights, Liberties, and Immunities": Church and State in Early Maryland

Cecil Calvert had issued instructions to his brother, Leonard,
the governor of the new colony, that all acts of Catholic worship
were to be done privately. The proprietor’s stricture did not
prevent the Catholic minority among the settlers, including the...

3. "Aliens, Savages, and Enemies of the Kingdome": Maryland and the Repercussions of the English Civil War

Since the summer of 1642 war had raged throughout England
between the forces of the crown and those of Parliament. The
anti-Catholic rhetoric and actions of the Puritan-dominated
Parliament (e.g., seizing two-thirds of the property of Catholics...

4. "Much as They Do at Home": The Irish Diaspora and the West Indies

On their voyage to Maryland in 1633 and 1634 Cecil Calvert’s adventurers
followed the typical Atlantic course ships took from
England to the Chesapeake region. The Ark and The Dove swung
southwest to the Canary Islands, then after a stay there of several...

5. "The Miracle of this Age": Maryland and New York under the Restoration

He that desires to see the real Platform of a quiet and sober Government
extant, Superiority with a meek and yet commanding power sitting
at the Helme, steering the actions of State quietly, through the
multitude and diversity of . . . waves that diversely meet, let him look...

6. "Against a Common Enemy": The Glorious Revolution and Its Consequences in the Atlantic World

In late July of 1688 Charles Carroll boarded a ship at London
bound for Maryland. From a once-titled Irish midlands family
that had lost most of its vast landholding and wealth in Cromwell’s
settlement of the 1650s, the twenty-five-year-old Carroll...

7. "Religion, Liberty, and Property": Maryland Catholics in the Early Penal Era

At the dawn of the eighteenth century Maryland was undergoing
major changes, not only in the political and religious spheres,
but in its demographic and economic ones, as well. First of all,
there was an unprecedented rate of growth in the population...

8. "Many to Attend, and Few to Attend Them": The Modes of Being an Outcast Community

In the first four decades of the eighteenth century the Catholic
population in Maryland more than tripled, reaching nearly
8,000 by the 1740s. Immigration was a major cause of this
growth, just as it accounted for a sharp diversification in the...

9. "[Catholics,] by the Very Principles of That Religion . . . Can Never Be Faithful Subjects": The Peaking of Anti-Catholicism and the Seven Years' War

In 1739 a broadside entitled Some Thoughts upon America, and
upon the Danger from Roman Catholicks There pleaded the necessity
of banning any Catholic settlement in the British colonies
because of the potential menace of Catholics there aligning...

10. "Who is This Man That Calls Himself a Citizen?": Catholics and the Road of Independence

In retrospect the outcome of the Seven Years’ War accelerated
the timetable for American Independence. The Treaty of Paris
reshaped in radical fashion the imperial landscape in North
America. The ceding of Canada and the Floridas to Great Britain...

11. "The Wonderful Work of That God Who Guards Your LIberties": Catholics and the Revolution

Article XIII of the initial “Articles of Confederation” proposed
by Benjamin Franklin in July 1775 invited “every colony from
Great Britain upon the Continent of North America and not at
present engag’d in our Association may upon application . . . be...

Epilogue: The Colonial Legacy

Seven months after the signing of the Peace of Paris at the end
of November 1782, John Carroll prodded John Lewis, the last
formal superior of the Maryland mission, to call a meeting of
the twenty-three priests in the new republic to consider a plan...

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